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Bird- Lore 



surprising skill in mimicry, the bird fluttered painfully along, ever just 

 beyond my reach until it had led me a hundred feet or more from its 

 young, and then, the feat evidently successful, it sailed away again, to 



perch first on a fence 

 and later on a limb in 

 characteristic, length- 

 wise Nighthawk atti- 

 tude. 



How are we to 

 account for the devel- 

 opment in so many 

 birds of what is now 

 a common habit ? 

 Ducks, Snipe, Grouse, 

 Doves, some ground - 

 nesting Sparrows and 

 Warblers, and many 

 other species, also 

 feign lameness with 

 the object of drawing a supposed enemy from the vicinity of their nest 

 or young. Are we to believe that each individual, who in this most 

 reasonable manner opposes strategy to force, does so intelligently? Or 

 are we to believe that the habit has been acquired through the agency 

 of natural selection and is now purely instinctive? Probably neither 

 question can be answered until we know be^'ond question whether this 

 mimetic or deceptive power is inherited. 



NIGHTHAWK FEIGNING LAMENESS 



NIGHTHAWK ON LIMB 



